By Michael A. Lough

The Sports Report

Few are likely to admit it publicly, but it’d be no surprise for FPD players to have been bummed out when Brookstone was dumped in the GIAA Class 4A baseball semifinals last week.

After all, one team has broken the Vikings hearts two years in a row in the state championship series.

Brookstone.

The only thing better than the Vikings coming through in this week’s championship series would be doing so against Brookwood.

That went out the window when the Cougars lost at home 11-4 and 7-3.

But if the Vikings weren’t going to get revenge against Brookstone, they have a shot at the next best thing, or, next best opponent.

Stratford.

FPD's Keon Johnson has a big future waiting, on an elite college team or in the pros, but the only two words that matter to him: state champs

The Eagles stunned the Cougars in Columbus with those wins last week, after FPD had vanquished Athens Christian, to set up the All-Macon final at Georgia Southern’s J.I. Clements Stadium.

The schedule of games starts at 10 a.m. Thursday and Friday, with Saturday’s schedule to be determined.

Citizens Christian and David Emanuel are in the Class A final, followed by Gatewood and Heritage in AA at 1 p.m. and Valwood and Deerfield-Windsor in AAA at 4 p.m.

The Eagles and Vikings will end the first days with a hoped-for 7 p.m. first pitch. It’ll be a miracle if weather doesn’t disrupt things, as it did with two days of championship soccer in Macon.

FPD still playing is no surprise. The Vikings have been among the top teams in any association or class all year, and returned plenty of experience from last year, when Brookstone broke a 23-game winning streak with a 9-3 win in the opener and turned that into a two-game losing streak with a 3-2 win for the title.

A year earlier, in Macon at Luther Williams Field, Brookstone won 7-3 and 9-5.

Meanwhile, Stratford battled through plenty of youth under veteran but then-first-year head coach Barry Veal, who finished the 2024 season as interim head coach before taking over officially. A team with no seniors finished 19-15, losing to FPD 7-1 and 6-5 in the second round.

The Eagles are still young – only two seniors, Ellis Bridges and Hayden Camps - but have plenty of experience.

“We're still young grade wise, but we're not young baseball wise,” said Veal, also the school’s athletics director. “I knew this team was talented, I knew we had a chance to do something.”

Knocking off the Vikings would more than qualify as “something.”

FPD’s senior class is 86-16-1 the past three seasons, two of them ending in championship heartbreak and frustration.

Vanderbilt-bound pro prospect Keon Johnson leads the way, but he has more than plenty of company on the can’t-pitch-around list. Like pretty much the next eight in the lineup.

The Vikings are roster-wise the opposite of the Eagles. Eight of the nine starters are seniors, and that group includes other college signees, like Brady McHugh with East Tennessee State, Conner Strandmark with Mercer, and Wyatt Waters with Augusta.

The record book needs a lot of whiteout this summer.

Veal isn’t worried that the Eagles are in any awe of the Vikings, in large part because of the familiarity between the teams. It’s hard to be nervous or tentative when around people you know.

FPD won last year’s series 6-0 and 10-2 before the playoff sweep, Stratford making strides in between. The Eagles led 5-0 in the second game this season, but lost when FPD scored four in the seventh to tie it and three in the ninth - on Harrison Keenan’s homer - to win.

Oddly, the Vikings outhit Stratford 15-5 in that game but needed extra innings.

“The first game, Strandmark really stuck it to us,” Veal said. “What we cannot do against them is walk people. They're going to get hits. They’re as good a high-school hitting team as you'll see.

“They're going to get hits. We just can't put people on base for free before they get all the hits.”

The second game was frustration.

“We played our tails off, and felt like you know we let one get away,” Veal said. “Like I told the guys back then, our goal now is to (get another shot). Here we are. We’ve done the hard part.”

FPD has advantages everywhere on paper, but the gaps may not be too huge.

The Eagles have some pitching depth, too.

Casey Von Waldner, Harrison Camps, and Cole Pruitt have pitched in 10 games, as has Cole Sasser, out with injury. Von Waldner has 12 starts and is 9-2 with 87 strikeouts and 20 walks in 72.2 innings.

Camps is 5-2 and Fritz 4-2. Sasser out of the pen is 3-0 with 28 strikeouts in 23 innings.

Camps is likely to get the ball first with Von Waldner on Friday.

Brooks Stella leads Stratford with 11 homers and 45 RBI, followed by Bobby Wooten with five and 34.

“We might have hit five home runs last year,” Veal said. “We’ve probably got 20 25 this year.”

Stratford has boosted its power output, but not at the expense of some small-ball. Wooten has 33 stolen bases, with 31 from Jett Johnston and 24 from Tucker Johnston.

Tate and Tucker Johnston have cracked the .400 mark, Tate at .424 and Jett at .404, with Stella at .356 and Wooten at .348. Seven starters are batting over .300.

A major key has been the Eagles returning to preseason practice more than ready to go, and to build on last year’s potential.

“We showed it from the start,” Veal said. “The first game of the year, we played Athens Christian, who just lost in the semis to FPD, and we beat them pretty bad. The year before, the first game of the year we played them and we got beat real bad.”

Stella and Von Waldner are transfers from Perry who fit in quickly with a team that ranks among the most fun Veal’s ever coached. And he’s in his 23rd season as a head coach (21 at Jones County, second at Stratford).

“I had a lot of confidence in this team, and I expected them to be good,” said Veal, who didn’t have to work to get the Eagles to work. “Everybody improved. We’ve got good leadership, and everybody wants to play. They love being out there.”

Which is a familiar modus operandi for FPD. But the Vikings are who they are skill-wise.

“We knew coming into the season that FPD was the No. 1 team,” Veal said. “We felt like we were in the mix with two or three other teams to maybe be the second-best team.

“We know how good FPD is. But if you want to be the best, you’ve got to beat the best.”

Class AA: Gatewood vs. Heritage

Gatewood knows this stage well, and performs well on it.

The Gators are going for their fourth straight title, each on a different field, in their sixth consecutive trip, and enter the final series on a four-game winning streak, after a shaky 4-3 stretch late in the season.

The 20-8 Gators have played a solid schedule, including 4A finalist FPD and semifinalist Athens Christian as well as Tattnall.

The 19-13 Hawks have taken on Brookstone, FPD, John Milledge as well as public school teams from Georgia and Alabama. All eight losses were to higher-classification teams, including Augusta Christian, which plays in South Carolina’s private-school group.

Gatewood won the 2024 state title in Macon, dispatching of Edmund Burke in three games, after taking the 2023 trophy.

The Gators are led by sophomores Ben Pearson, Lawson Moore, and Jayden Moss as well, each around .400 or better. The trio is also part of a solid pitching staff.